


as painless and colourful

by droppingdroplets



Category: Minecraft (Video Game), Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Character Study, Emotional Manipulation, Hurt/Comfort, It's not a big thing but some of Dream's current actions are acknowledged, Suicidal Thoughts, TommyInnit-centric
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-11
Updated: 2020-12-11
Packaged: 2021-03-10 18:02:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,580
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28001355
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/droppingdroplets/pseuds/droppingdroplets
Summary: Grief has planted deep roots in Tommy's mind. In the garden of exile it grows past him, until it's hard to see a happy ending.A happy ending tries to find him anyway.
Relationships: Dave | Technoblade & Wilbur Soot & TommyInnit & Phil Watson
Comments: 32
Kudos: 888





	as painless and colourful

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [warmth from any other source](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27965435) by [cacowhistle](https://archiveofourown.org/users/cacowhistle/pseuds/cacowhistle). 



> I'll admit, I wasn't planning on writing anything based on the immediate canon, but sometimes you read something that speaks to you so much you have to write down the reverb. Go read cacowhistle's 'warmth from any other source'; it's an absolutely gorgeous fic and I hope this comes close to capturing the emotions reading it made me feel.

The Nether isn’t home, but it’s the closest thing he’s got.

In his heart, he knows it’s the closest he’ll ever get. Here, the ash-painted footprints are a path of their own, a map of memories sprawled across his feet – he might not be able to follow them beginning to end, but at least he can walk alongside them for a time. Here, there are half-formed walls he’s allowed to walk through, roads he’s allowed to make, signs he’s allowed to read.

There, anything at all is far out of his reach. His hands are already aching from a night deep in the mines, welcoming the warmth over cool stone and minerals. He’s checked and checked and checked the horizon to find not even a false hope of home across the ocean. Not even a reflection. Not that he needs it. Not so long as he’s here.

Looking directly into the lava makes his eyes burn. If he squints, he can almost mistake the colour for a plank-made path; mistake the texture next to him for cobblestone. If he looks the wrong way, he can see himself at home – just a step away, free to take it whenever he was ready.

Tommy steadies himself with a breath, and feels ashes settle in his lungs.

Ahead of him is home; framed in a pane of shimmering purple that he looks at until he grows afraid it’ll stain his memories. Behind him is his exile; wrapped in an ocean that splits the land apart, Tubbo on one side and Tommy cast to the other.

He’d been delivered here on a road of saltwater; ripples of transparent blues. Below him, the lava is an ocean of solid red.

He wonders where it’d take him.

He knows without a doubt it’d _take_ him. Any trace he could’ve left would be swallowed, a burial secured on a funeral pyre.

Wherever he’d go, he wouldn’t be able to come back.

Tommy’s grip tightens on the ledge, eyes stinging. He’s not yet ready to pass the point of no return; to admit that there’s no going home. He didn’t want to leave – he wants to _go back_. He casts a glance to the portal, a shadow within blinding lights, and thinks of the stars in the sky on the other side.

They’d just been starting to show when he’d left; if he went back now he could get a good glimpse, and hope that someone was watching them with him.

He lets go of the ledge, putting his hands behind him and crawling up and over onto the path. Without anything to hold onto the tips of his fingers shake; he presses his hands together to stall the tremors, and does his best to forget the sight of it. His breaths are unsteady, but that’s fine, the light-headedness is probably from the heat.

Instinct starts his direction. He stops, faced with the portal, and squints for a silhouette that never shows. Dream’s absence is something he’s unsure what to think about beyond wondering what exactly he could get away with. How long would it take until they next crossed paths?

He could go. Go home. Go away. Dream’s the only thing keeping him here; a warning in his words and threat on a sharpened blade.

 _It’s not your time to die_.

The high of being near home sinks to the bottom of his stomach and further still. His feet feel like lead, weighted down with indecision.

 _It’s never my time to die_.

Tommy lifts a foot, then turns on his heel. If he’s got more time left, he might as well stop wasting it here.

<>

  
  


“D’you think it looks more like sky blue or ocean blue?” Tommy asks, back flat against the ground, rolling onto his side to better compare the results himself.

“What?” Wilbur – the ghost of him, at least – says. When he looks over, his younger brother is holding out a handful of blue, shifting it back and forth until the blur of it is hard to distinguish. “Well, I think it’d depend, wouldn’t it? Why?”

Tommy sighs, a mournful thing. “I thought you’d know,” He says, sitting up; though he doesn’t stop moving the blue between sky and sea. “Since you’re so – since it’s your thing now, y’know? I can’t decide, and apparently all your experience with it is for nothing.”

“I don’t exactly do that with it,” Wilbur points out, sitting next to Tommy. Together, they watch the blue next to the sky, blushing white with thick clouds. Then, the ocean, dark and deep. “Hm. I think… ocean. What do you think, Tommy?”

“I think I told you I couldn’t decide,” Tommy huffs, but goes through the motions again with Wilbur’s contribution in mind. He hums in vague agreement, then lowers the blue to look at his brother instead. “Why’d you say _it’d_ _depend_?”

“Well, I thought it’d depend.”

“On _what?”_

Wilbur’s quiet for a moment, then reaches into his pocket. Out of it comes another handful of blue, which he holds up for them both to look at. “On lots of things, really – the sky’s not always the same colour, and ocean blue can be different from the blue it reflects... it’s always a pretty shade, though. This blue is the same, really, even if it looks different sometimes. That’s the most important thing, isn’t it?”

Wilbur holds the blue out. Tommy takes it, watching the shade brighten and darken as he wrings it through his hands, barely even a solid colour. He imagines it falling through his hands like water, though it’s caught between his fingers.

“I guess.” Tommy murmurs, and layers the two bundles on the ground to see if they were the same shade.

“Do you think it’ll match the blue Techno’s wearing now?” Wilbur asks.

Tommy stiffens, “Does it matter?”

“I don’t know,” Wilbur says. Tommy’s stomach churns. “I think it’d be nice to compare. Maybe we can give him some; he’ll be able to keep it that way.”

“Oh, he can keep it that way just fine.” Tommy hisses, “He doesn’t need to be given anything, he’s sure got more than we have. He probably already has blue anyway! He probably already has everything he needs and then some for good fucking measure. We don’t need to give him anything else. We’re not giving him anything at all.”

Wilbur opens his mouth, then closes it without saying anything. His sigh is the final breath of the unspoken words behind them; Tommy doesn’t mourn the loss.

“Are you sure?” Wilbur asks eventually.

He’s mourned for one brother long before the rotting corpse left was laid to rest. He’s mourning the loss of another before it comes to that; the withers and the explosions and the devastation a familiar path. It’s easy to retrace the steps.

“I’m sure.” Tommy answers.

When he looks back to the blue, he can hear the fireworks, see Tubbo searching him out; the last thing he’d before being blinded by the following blast to his chest. Red had lingered in sparks, heat still emanating from the box when Tommy had leant over the barrier. It had all been behind him, his brother included, as he’d searched for bright blue eyes.

Those same blue eyes that had turned him away, heavier than the hand on his back steering him far beyond the walls.

Tubbo had already been dead by the time Tommy had reached him.

He wonders if the fireworks had burned.

<>

  
  


Tommy’s first instinct had been to make armour.

He’d grown up with legends of survival – Philza’s single life, even if he’d joke the heart attack from close-calls would get to him before anything else would at the rate he was going; Technoblade’s myriad of wars waged against him, to the point he’d wondered if being here was like child’s play. Wilbur had regaled him with stories, sung second-hand accounts and nodded along to Tommy’s own.

He’d blame them for this, if he hadn’t fallen into the trap of thinking it’d be this _easy_.

Dream watches him and waits.

Right now, the iron is the cleanest thing he owns. His hair is growing dark with dirt and dust, no matter how many times he visits the ocean to wash it out; no matter how long he sits there and waits and runs his hands through his hair. His hands are stained with coal, scratched up by stone.

His shirt has started to rip, blood welling between the seams. He needs this.

He supposes that’s the point.

“Come on now,” Tommy says, though his hands are already on the buckles, already loosened, already ready for what’s about to happen. It’s not the first time. It won’t be the last. “This is just – it’s a bit overkill, don’t you think? Isn’t there anything that could -”

“You could get this over with already.” Dream says cheerfully. Tommy feels none of it as he grumbles and curses, but he swears he can see the grin on the mask widen as he throws his armour down into the pit.

“Fuck you.” Tommy says, his final words before the TNT falls. He watches the spark alight, watches the palest shade of blue reflected in the metal at his feet and does nothing to stop it.

(When has he ever been able to stop it?)

The TNT swells, spits, and swallows the iron whole. Something in his chest hurts, and he wonders briefly if it’s anything like the last thing Wilbur must have felt.

Wilbur’s not here. Dream is, wrapping an arm around his shoulder and pulling him away from the ledge of the pit, “See? Everything’s good, was that so hard? And now we can really get stuff done – remind me to bring some blocks, though, wouldn’t want to leave you with no ground left to stand on...”

Tommy looks over his shoulder. Brown scars litter the earth, indents like fingers trying to scrabble out of the pit. It’s tiny, comparatively, but Tommy feels very small crowded by the green of Dream’s hoodie pressed against him. His skin burns at the touch.

When Dream lets go, he looks back. A faint _hiss_ cuts off, a creeper impaled on the end on Dream’s sword, way too close for comfort. Tommy finds himself staring, long after the danger has passed. He wonders what would’ve happened had Dream not been there.

He doesn’t get a chance to ponder it for a long; a huff of laughter as a hand pats his back with enough force to prompt a stumbling step forward. He lets himself go, the ground parting for him beneath his feet, but is held back from falling face-first into the mines.

“Careful.” Dream says, then laughs as though it’s an inside joke. Tommy doesn’t return the smile. “Come on then, get going. We wanna get something done before nightfall, right?”

“Right.” Tommy says. On the way down, all the iron veins have been bled dry long before this excursion. It’s hardly a loss; there’s so much of it buried beneath that they stumble across more without even looking for it. This time he hesitates, but he mines it anyway, and tries not to feel held down by a weight Dream refuses to share with him.

He’s not sure what to do with it any more.

<>

Tommy’s eyes have long since adjusted to the ache courtesy of the campfire.

They haven’t yet adjusted to the shadow-suited companion by his side, grumbling half-heartedly at the rain from where he’s awkwardly crammed under the canopy of the tent. Tommy only has an idea of a guest-tent, but he’s more than happy to give up his only shelter for now, peering through the felled logs to make sure he’d built the campfire right.

It’s a surprise every time he looks back. He doesn’t know what else he’s expecting; for Ranboo to be gone, or replaced with the mobs that haunt the night dawning on them. It’s a sharp contrast; the light of the campfire and the darkness surrounding it, his expectations and his reality.

Tommy looks up to the sky, and tries to see past the smoke veiling rolling waves of heavy clouds. He misses the stars.

“You know,” Ranboo says, and pretends not to notice the way Tommy jumps as though lightning has struck nearby. “This isn’t so bad. I’d say today went pretty well.”

“Yeah.” Tommy says, stifling a cough. Finding words is easy, but he’s finding it harder and harder to find his voice, losing it in the space that surrounds him endlessly. “Yeah. I’d say it went _really_ fucking well, actually, and it’s not… It could be worse.”

“It could be worse,” Ranboo agrees sagely. Despite being tall in a tent too small for the average person, he shifts to make room anyway, trying not to stare at the stains that don’t quite wash out of Tommy’s clothes. “Well, you made room for me in here, I think I can try making some room for you.”

Tommy laughs, poking and prodding sticks into the fire. It’s more like a toy than a tool to him, letting a stick spark alight only to pull it away from the fire and nurse it himself, a game that the rain never lets him take very far, “You really don’t have to, I’m good out here.”

“I’m trying anyway,” Ranboo says, moving his bag for its resting spot at his side and laying it over his knees. “It’ll be easier to share like this too.”

“Share?” Tommy says, surrendering the sticks to the fire and shuffling over. “I don’t remember sharing being on today’s agenda.”

Ranboo laughs and shakes his head, distracted momentarily as he tries to recall which items were where. Out of it he pulls two wooden bowls, regarding the sky before deciding their fire would suffice enough to risk handing one over. “I don’t remember either, but I remembered bringing this so we might as well most the most of it.”

The scent hits him first, like a breath of fresh air against the smothering smoke. Tommy doesn’t realize how long he’s gone without stew until he’s holding a bowl of it in his hands, pies and potatoes and bread following too. Preservation is his immediate thought; the urge to stuff it in a chest where it’ll never rot, a record of memories he wants to visit instead of letting waste away.

“Oh.” Is all he manages for a long moment, a pitiful smile all he has left to show for it when he remembers he’s not alone. “Thank you.”

“Yeah.” Ranboo says. “No problem.”

“I mean we have food here too,” Tommy blurts, a shield from the threat of silence. “Apples, mostly. Lots of apples – very nice, very fresh.”

Ranboo swallows a mouthful of stew; Tommy starts with his own and tries not to taste apples. “They must come with the logs.”

“With the logs, yes – no they come with the _trees_ , not the logs. If anything they come from the leaves, actually, and that’s why they’re very good apples –“

“Why are we talking about apples?” Wilbur asks, shadows and smoke peeling away into a mirrored memory. Some of the flames bow at the chill his approach brings forth. “I can go and get you some. We have lots here.”

“I’m not going to say no,” Ranboo admits. “Do you, uh, do you eat?”

“Not really.” Wilbur says.

“Do you want some of this?” Ranboo says anyway, holding up his own bowl. “We can share.”

“I like sharing!” Wilbur decides. “Do you want to come back to Logsteadshire with me? A house is easier to share than a tent.”

Ranboo glances at Tommy, who shrugs. “Sure. Not like this raining is letting up anytime soon.”

Rain doesn’t touch Wilbur, though it seems to have escaped his notice. Ranboo notices it keenly well; just as he notices how indifferent Tommy is as they gather what little they have and make haste for the short journey across the plains. Without the fire there’s a stretch of darkness; a promenade for monsters.

Tommy doesn’t pull out a weapon when Ranboo does, looking at the monsters while seeing through the danger. There’s a silent conversation between them, one that Ranboo isn’t privy too, as Tommy walks out without any armour and bares his arms wide, embracing the rain without a thought to the target it paints on him as skeletons shoot and zombies amble towards them.

Wilbur tries to hurry them up; Ranboo slows down. He picks them off one by one until it’s just the three of them in a house out of reach even to the monsters.

Tommy looks out the window. From his tent, the torches had backlit the surrounding walls into something deep, dark and cold. Embers keep it warm, retain the image of logs instead of obsidian.

He looks down instead of up, shifting until the lights inside are reflected behind his eyelids.

He feels heavy, but not with the weight of having to carry a conversation. It continues without him, a steady pace that lulls him to sleep.

When he wakes, they go to the portal together. Ranboo carries a handful of apples with him for the journey home, red-ripe and cushioned in his pack, heavier than the bow in his hands. Dawn comes with a vengeance for the monsters – but even when they’re burning, even when they’re in Tommy’s line of light – Ranboo shoots them anyway.

He’s no longer sure they see the same thing when looking at monsters.

<>

  
  


Dream gifts him a set of armour.

Rather, he gifts him the chance to keep a set. Tommy doesn’t need it, but he takes it anyway – it fills something he hadn’t known was empty and so he resolves to keep it close while he can.

A compass is kept close to his heart, in a chest pocketing the end where nobody can reach it, framed by records and music and memories. They’re safe there; safe from anyone’s touch. They might try taking away his access to them, but that only gives him something to search for. They can’t take that away from him.

Over his heart, the plated iron is a cage. He keeps his hands on the leather straps holding the whole thing together, ready to take it apart at a moments notice. He prefers it off, really – his skin is too cold otherwise, and it weighs him down considerably more than he remembers.

Being in a new place just puts him in a different perspective, able to see now what he couldn’t before. Armour had done little to truly shield him – without it, what would have changed at all?

Wilbur hadn’t worn armour. He’s not like Wilbur.

Tommy wonders if there’ll come a day where a set of armour outlives him.

<>

  
  


A pearl is in his hand, glittering green dulled as he throws it across the roof. He’s looking for someone. He’s lost them in a storm of reds and blues and whites that howl at him.

A compass is in his hand, gold-stricken silver as he throws it into the lava. He’s followed it somewhere. He’s lost sight of what’s supposed to be past the edge of the point.

“What’s it like forgetting things, Wilbur?” Tommy asks later, hands grasping at empty air.

“I don’t know if I can really say,” Wilbur admits. “It’s… confusing, I think, but I can’t say it’s bad. It’s rather nice, actually.”

Tommy presses his hands against his eyes, trying the push away the exhaustion keeping his gaze low.

“Why?” Wilbur asks.

“Do you remember dreaming, Wilbur?”

“I-I... don’t know.”

“Yeah.” Tommy says. “Me either.”

<>

Snow falls around him, and he tries not to feel jealous as a sum of snowflakes become part of a whole.

Afraid of looking back to find his own footsteps missing, he focuses ahead on his communicator’s display. Wilbur’s last message is a cryptic thing, one that he’d cursed and parroted and made fun of it until he gave into the hope that listening would earn him the favour in kind. It’s a direction – not towards L’manberg, just away from Logsteadshire.

It’s a promise; _if I don’t come back, you’re welcome to come find me._

After a day passes with no word from his brother, that’s exactly what he does. It’s not as easy as he expects it to be, hesitating with their joint work still in sight. Dream will be waiting for him; he’s gotten into the habit of visiting.

There’s a thrill in that. Someone waiting for him. _Something_ waiting for him. If he leaves, will they stay for his return?

Tommy’s tired of waiting. Wilbur can’t have gone far – ghost he may be, he doesn’t have many places to go. Tommy has time to spare; he’ll just have to make use of it, however much or little he has. And if Wilbur isn’t here, nobody can say he didn’t try and Tommy can argue that he very much did.

White surrounds his vision. It’s the sky and the ground, ahead and behind, before each step and after.

It’s very lonely.

Tommy walks until he can’t feel the snow spilling into his shoes, until he can’t feel his feet to know he still has shoes. Tommy walks until the sheer white of the snow becomes an off-grey, until he collapses on it and burrows in, blanketed by numbness. He can get up whenever he likes, but his limbs have become part of the snow and he’s quite fond of the company. He looks across the horizon, and marvels at the stars scattered atop the snow.

He could stay here. He could go away. He could...

A shadow falls over him while he’s deliberating. While he wonders how the night has snuck up on him, it settles into waves of blue and pink, a crinkling sunset that comes into focus with red eyes and a weary snort. “You planning on getting up, or are you good down there?”

“Fuck off, Techno.” Tommy says, bitter that waiting hadn’t even led to someone coming to look for him. He doesn’t want to be found. “Go away.”

Silence falls. Tommy can’t feel it.

“Is that it?” Techno asks. “I could always kick you while you’re down, but I don’t think you can go any lower. Come on, Tommy, get up.”

There’s a hand on his shoulder, hauling him up with a force that sears his nerves and leaves him choking on cold, unforgiving air. Tommy doesn’t fight it, trying to muster a glare at his brother’s boots that’s lost when Techno meets his gaze.

He wonders what his brother’s thinking, looking at him now.

Techno reaches out, the movement stuttering only once. He brushes the snow from his shoulders, and taps the armour underneath with a thoughtful hum, “You’re wearing armour again.”

Tommy’s compromises his attempted glare for a wary frown, “Yeah? Dream gave it to me.”

“ _Dream_ gave that to you?” Techno asks. “Wilbur told me he kept blowing it all up.”

“He did.” Tommy nods, “Every day. He’s letting me keep it this time.”

Techno huffs at that, watching him intently. Tommy’s familiar with it – he just doesn’t know what else Techno wants from him. He doesn’t have anything left to give.

“Do you want it?” Tommy asks in a moment of clarity, hands already on the fastenings. He’s had plenty of practice by now, but his hands are shaking too much to get a good grip and then there’s another hand overlaying his – he flinches away from it, and his brother obliges in letting him go.

“No.” Techno’s quick to say, “Absolutely not. Now I’m starting to see why Wilbur’s worried.”

Wilbur’s worried. Something about those words don’t sit right in the still air.

“Why’s Dream giving you armour, Tommy?” Techno asks. “Why are you taking it?”

Tommy doesn’t answer.

“Wilbur’s worried.” Techno repeats, as though the words are supposed to mean something to him. “I’m getting a little weirded out too.”

“’Cause he gave me armour?” Tommy says, but it clicks like a struck match, sudden and searing as a laugh tumbles from him. “Like _you did?”_

Techno goes quiet; his expression steeled.

“Yeah,” Tommy hisses. “It’s not even enchanted, you don’t get to _say shit_ – what does Wilbur care anyway, if he’d rather talk to you than me?”

“Tommy.” Techno starts, spreading his hands wide, in surrender, in peace. Tommy doesn’t give him the chance to rally a defence of words, lunging for his brother, fists landing against his chest with no regard for the resulting bloody knuckles. Techno raises his hands, hesitates, then lowers them with a sigh undented by the continued assault.

Tommy’s baring his teeth – sharp enough to draw blood from his tongue, staining his teeth, but not sharp enough to truly intimidate his brother. Techno stands still, not even his cloak giving way, as the last threads of Tommy’s composure unravels before him.

There’s a moment, in the midst of his tirade, where Tommy slams his hands against Techno’s chest and doesn’t pull back. When he goes to follow it with a headbutt Techno finally moves so he catches the cushion of his cloak’s fur lining instead, a hand against the back of his head to keep his pressed there. Tommy wails, all the words at war with each other, until only cries are left.

“I want to go.” Tommy cries, the words painful. “I want to go, let me go.”

“No.” Techno says simply, tracing patterns into the roots of Tommy’s hair. He’s more likely to tangle it than anything, but so does the way his brother leans back into the touch.

“I didn’t want to go.” Tommy cries. He isn’t sure what he’s mourning any more; there’s so much loss within him that he’s afraid there’ll be nothing left at all.

“I know,” Techno sighs eventually, though Tommy can scarcely hear it over his blood boiling. When he tries to drop into the snow and lose himself within it he’s caught instead, lifted from the plains until the cold settled on his skin is overwritten with warmth. “I hate it when Wilbur’s right. Come on, I’ve done my bit, Phil can take care of the rest.”

Tommy doesn’t have much choice in the matter, but he can’t find it within himself to protest. He doesn’t know where they’re going – doesn’t look to figure it out – but he’d quite like to stay with someone.

He wouldn’t’ve minded being left. It’s not a startling thought, he’s been convincing himself of it to numb the pain that comes with being left behind.

It must be working.

He can’t feel much at all.

<>

  
  


“Oh.” Wilbur says, when Tommy reaches an arm out of bed to better squint at the armour laid neatly on top of a chest. “You’re awake!”

Tommy turns to stare at him.

Wilbur shifts, uncertain, but wanders over slowly. “Do you remember what happened?”

Tommy isn’t sure what he means; the discs, their melody, their wars, the exile, the lava, the snow. He nods anyway, horrified to feel tears overflowing with an ache that blossoms in his limbs, his eyes burning as his vision blurs. Wilbur makes a devastated little sound, and Tommy curls up with the hope this will be forgotten, that he can keep to himself the stuttered breaths beaten out of his chest by a tender heart.

He bows his head in the face of a solid shadow towering over him. Voices murmur under the shallow depths of his breathing, quick and quiet; a soft “It’s okay, I’ve got him.”

A hand cups around the nape of his neck, pulling him into a solid shade of green. Tommy buries himself in it, everything else surfacing without his say, the hands combing through his hair digging up a restless storm that crashes over him full-force.

He doesn’t know how long they stay there, but he holds on to keep the moment from never leaving.

“Shh.” Philza’s voice comes eventually, rocking them back and forth. “It’s okay, mate, just keep breathing.”

His tears dry up eventually, but they stay there for much longer. When he looks up, Wilbur’s fidgeting with a handful of blue, offering a strained smile when he notices he’s being watched, “Hi, Tommy.”

“Hi.” Tommy says, throat dry and voice cracked.

“Hi,” Philza returns. “How are you feeling? Think you can manage some soup?”

Tommy can barely manage being awake. He must say as much, or maybe the amount of weight he’s leaning on Philza speaks for him, as the hand in his hand moves him into a more comfortable position. “That’s okay. You can go back to sleep, Tommy. We’ll be here, soup’ll be here for as long as you need.”

Tommy hums, keeping his hand anchored to green robes. Another hand joins him, wrapped in yellow, plucking at threads without moving them.

He’s warm.

It feels a little like home.

<>

  
  


“Why?” Tommy asks. It’s too small a word to fit everything they’ve been through into it – _why did you help us, why did you kill Tubbo, why did you have the withers ready, why did you bring me here_?

Techno doesn’t seem to mind, “That’s a loaded question, Tommy.”

Technoblade’s home is a humble little thing; a retreat in more than name. Shying away from the nearby village, it houses the four of them comfortably, despite the occasional cramped moments. Tommy doesn’t mind, watching contentedly as his brother points out the chests he’s allowed to rifle through.

“You gonna answer it or not?” Tommy asks, his hands on the chest marking the boundary that’s been set. Of the lined walls, he’s got free-range of about half of them, though he’d much rather ask than help himself.

“Nah.” Techno says, and laughs to himself before taking a seat. “See, Tommy, it’s really not all that complicated. I did it because I wanted to. It’s kind of the basis of most decisions people make.”

“Well then why’d you want to?” Tommy asks. His voice has burned out to an ember, starved of the company that he’s used to fuelling it. It’s coming back slowly, strength exercised by conversations, but there’s still a lull of quiet contemplation that filters through the atmosphere.

Techno hums, keeping a complete silence from driving such things away. “Depends. Why’d you want to stay in the snow?”

“That’s not fair.” Tommy decides. “A question’s not an answer, Techno. You can’t have an answer if it’s really a question.”

“Was it a good answer?” Techno says, as though he needs to ask.

Tommy scoffs, looking away. It’s not just staying; it wasn’t just the snow. He’s not sure what he wants to do with that, not sure if there’s anything he _can_ , but he has it and he keeps it close.

“Do you think Dream misses me?” Tommy asks instead.

“If he does, that’s not a good thing.” Techno says, opening the chest next to him. It’s one of the ones across the boundary, and he gestures Tommy over to look inside it. “We’ll talk about it later, probably, when we have a better idea of what’s going on.”

“Is that why Wilbur’s going?” Tommy asks, padding over. He stumbles, unused to the terrain of a flat floor, but manages not to stub his toe as he peaks over the edge of the chest and squints at the myriad of papers held within.

Techno pulls one out and hands it over; a painting of the snow they’re within now, a single figure silhouetted in the distance. “He’s coming back. He’s just double-checking things.”

“Sure.” Tommy says, tracing the familiar images. Another one is pressed into his hands, then another, then another. “Do you think he can maybe pass a message with him? Just in case?”

“Ask him.”

“Sure. I’ll do that.” Another one is pressed into his hands – he does a double-take at it. “Techno, this is your wanted poster.”

“Yep.” Techno says proudly.

Tommy turns the paper upside-down in his hands, but the image is still the same; soot-stained at the edges, blotted ink and curling edges. “Where did you even… did you really go and take one of your wanted posters for _yourself_?”

“I look good in it!” Techno answers, and smiles when Tommy bursts into laughter.

<>

  
  


Wilbur gets a bag before he goes. Tommy helps him fill it, not at all practised, but it fills the moments when the others are handling the busy-work. There’s a note, for Ranboo. There’s words, for Tubbo.

In the middle of rehearsing the message, Tommy finds himself struck with an urge to say something before Wilbur goes.

“You remember dying.” Tommy starts, stops, then tries again. “Dying made you happy.”

Wilbur’s smile goes strained, head tilted in confusion. “Are we still talking to Tubbo?”

“No.” Tommy answers quickly. “No, no, just… me to you, Wilbur. Right?”

Wilbur contemplates that for a long moment, humming so that Tommy isn’t left to linger in silence. “No… not quite, _Phil_ made me happy.”

Tommy’s brows furrow, “Is there a difference?”

“I don’t know.” Wilbur admits, “I know that I forget things a lot, so there are some things about dying that I probably _don’t_ know. I know that I was happy Phil was there.”

“Oh.” Tommy says. “Okay.”

Wilbur watches him for a long moment, then adds. “I know that I’m happy to be here too, Tommy. With Phil. With Techno. With you.”

“Thanks.”

“Are you okay, Tommy?”

Tommy shakes his head, silent. Wilbur hums sympathetically, “That’s okay. We’re still here for you.”

“Can you – can you ask Tubbo if he looks up at the stars?” Tommy asks, when he finds his voice.

“Of course,” Wilbur says. “Are you going to be watching them together? Can I join you? You should ask Techno and Phil about the stars, maybe they can join us too. That’d be nice, wouldn’t it?”

“Yeah.” Tommy says, through a sigh of relief. “That’d be nice.”

<>

  
  


Shielded by the buffer of a thick cloak over his shoulders, Tommy’s finally ready to brave the cold once more. Instead of facing it outside he goes to the deepest part of the building, ignoring the horse outside in favour of the cow that watches him with beady eyes and trots around him.

“His name is Bob.” Philza tells him, barely stifling amusement as he copies Tommy’s lead in patting the creature’s head. “The horse outside is named Carl.”

“Bob.” Tommy echoes, the name sour-sweet in his tongue. “Phil, can I ask you something?”

“Go ahead.” Phil answers immediately.

Tommy glances to the ladder leading up and out. Wilbur hasn’t returned yet, not as far as they know, but for once things aren’t as quiet in his absence. He wonders what it’s like back there, but doesn’t linger on it for long. He’ll find out.

“How come you haven’t gone back yet?” Tommy asks.

Phil glances at him with a fond smile. “I’ve got things here I want to stay for.”

Tommy nods, managing not to startle when a hand rests on his shoulder. It’s familiar, in a good way. It burns less.

Tommy feels less like a stranger in his own skin, but he can’t help wonder if Tubbo misses him. If Tubbo’ll miss him even when they’re right next to each other.

He wonders if he’ll be missing Tubbo forever. He hopes not.

<>

  
  


A compass is in his hands; a record playing by his side. Tommy leans against the jukebox, listening to the harmony of Philza’s laughter as Wilbur dances to the music, Technoblade’s murmuring as he fights to keep the windows closed before the snow falls in.

His heart is achingly tender, warmed by the gentle light rising from the depths of the horizon. Pale yellows, like his brother’s sweater, scatter across the snow, cut into rays of white that shimmer as his head bobs back and forth.

“Tommy,” Wilbur says, hovering over his head. “You should come join us! Do you want to? You look tired, actually, do you want to go to bed?”

“Not yet.” Tommy says, “Although, I had an idea – could you do me a favour?”

Wilbur tilts his head, curiousity betrayed by the intensity by which he regards Tommy asking if he could pass a snowball and lure Techno outside. Their eyes meet, agreement made, and in a matter of minutes Phil has his head in his hands as Tommy launches a snowball through the window directly at Techno’s head. It misses and his the back of his shoulder instead, but the message is delivered one way or another.

Techno turns away from where Wilbur is laughing. Tommy lifts a hand in a cheerful wave.

Tommy ducks just as a snowball sails over his head, a puff of white that scatters across the room. Techno groans from outside the window, “Now look at what you’ve made me do!” and Tommy lets his laughter keep him under the pane in case his brother has more ammo prepared.

He’s spared by the hour more than mercy; he hears footsteps by the window and braces himself for a snowball dunked on his head, and looks up when it never comes. Techno’s leaning through the window, snow melting in his hand, something soft in his posture and expression despite the sharp amusement curling his lips, “You good down there?”

“I’ll be a lot better if you keep that shit to yourself,” Tommy says, finally taking the initiative to shuffle around in search for cover. “Which you should do, instead of making messes for yourself to clean up after.”

Techno laughs, and leaps through the window, shutting it behind him. “Who’s to say I’m not gonna make you clean it up, Tommy?”

“Me.” Tommy decides, nodding to himself. “I’m to say, and my word here is law.”

“There is no law here, Tommy.”

“My word is definitely here - “

The end of the record also ends their conversation, voices too loud in the space the music had filled. Phil’s laughter is quieter now, quiet murmurs accompanied by Wilbur’s voice. Techno glances in their direction, then gestures his head to the jukebox, holding out a hand.

Tommy takes it, allowing himself to be pulled his feet and a step to face the music. He pulls the record out and holds it close, keeping the echoes until they’re embedded into his fingertips.

Techno inclines his head again. Tommy shakes his, “I’m gonna go put this away for the night. Maybe listen to it again in the morning.”

He doesn’t move, compass overlaying the record, pointing somewhere far beyond the window.

“Long way to go, huh?” Techno muses, voice deceptively light.

“Long way.” Tommy agrees.

“You’ve gotten this far,” Techno says, lifting his gaze. “Reckon you could probably make it to the couch, if the bed’s too far away.”

“Yeah. You’d know, wouldn’t you, is it even too far for you?”

“Don’t even try it.” Techno huffs, but Tommy can hear the laughter as his hair is ruffled and they finally start moving again. The record and the compass are both returned to the end chest; the fireplace returned to its former glory so they can all bask in it before the sun rises to take its place.

He doesn’t know if he’ll sleep. He does know he’ll rest, wrapped in blankets of blue, in close enough company that he can blame being awake on someone snoring.

It’s a start. It’s something more than what he began with.

Home is closer than it’s ever been before.


End file.
